HOW TO BRING OUT YOUR 'INNER DIANA'

THE CONFIDENCE COACH WHO HELPED THE PRINCESS OF WALES EXPLAINS WHAT MADE HER SO CAPTIVATING

- JAMES DESBOROUGH

If you want to achieve a sense of poise, radiance and confidence in how you project yourself, there are few examples better than Diana, Princess of Wales. And where better to look for tips on how she achieved her spellbinding air than with the man who helped to make her one of the most iconic voices of the 1990s?

Stewart Pearce, right, is an internationally renowned master of voice and presence coach who worked with the royal in the last two years of her life. As one of the world’s go-to guides, he has also helped statespeople and actors including Margaret Thatcher, Mo Mowlam, Vanessa Redgrave, Hugh Bonneville, Simon Callow and Eddie Redmayne.

Here, Stewart discusses his interactions with Diana and passes on some of the core practices and mindsets that helped her command any room...

1 FOCUS

“What’s interesting about the word focus in its original meaning is that it means hearth or fireside,” says Stewart. “And we all know what it’s like to sit around a log fire or hearth – we become compelled to stare into the flames. Yet today we really don’t have this facility in our lives any more. Instead, we have other light boxes, such as the TV or our tablets, which magnetise us and so conversations cease as everyone becomes enthralled by the light of the screen before them.

“Diana was extraordinarily beautiful and through her natural generosity saw how to evolve her own radiance – focus became the way she physically attended to her intention, by developing a laser-like quality of eye contact.